Stephanie Ghoston-Paul is a
recovering lawyer and an internationally recognized speaker,
facilitator, and organizational development consultant. She brings
over 15 years of experience in advancing equity, fostering
inclusive leadership and sparking systems transformation using
racial justice and healing frameworks.

Stephanie's unique approach
skillfully and wholeheartedly combines her sharp legal mind,
problem solving skills, and love of people to powerfully serve
clients and challenge existing systems. She has worked with leaders
and staff in the nonprofit, for-profit, education, foundation and
public sectors to integrate equity and inclusion into the core
identities of those organizations. She's well versed in assessing
organizational culture, tool building, and strategic coaching for
equity. Stephanie is also on the board for the Global Youth
Leadership Institute, a program she completed in high school as a
member of its founding cohort.

Stephanie mentions the following
resources during the episode for you to check out in doing your own
education surrounding equity and inclusion:

Stephanie also discusses some
shifts organizations must make to “prime:” their workplace for
inclusion and equity prior to hiring marginalized candidates to
reduce the likelihood for harm and increase retention:

Mindset
shift.This requires
the organization to become open and aware of ways supremacist and
patriarchal ideologies exist in the world and in the workplace. The
organization must commit to dismantling the systems and addressing
non-commitment by any and all individuals.

Cultural
shift. This requires
the organization to examine its cultural norms, affinity groups and
existing diversity. The organization must examine its norms for
communication, engagement and addressing differences and conflict
in its current population to make sure it is healthy before adding
additional diversity to the mix.

Policy
shift.This requires
the organization to look at its compensation, time off, leave and
other employee-centered policies to ensure they are inclusive and
minimize disparate impact. If the enforcement of these policies
currently have disparate impact, the organization needs to address
and resolve these issues before adding additional diversity to the
mix.

Stephanie strongly believes that
individuals, communities and organizations must be primed for a
foundational identity shift in order for any anti-bias, inclusion
and equity efforts to be long-lasting and sustainable. There also
needs to be a clear understanding of the appropriate workplace
relationship between interpersonal relationships and accountability
for the heart, mind, belief and behavior which causes inclusion
challenges to be overcome. Achieving this requires commitment to
anti-fragility and consequences for those who fail to fully,
sincerely commit.

Connect with Stephanie on
Twitter, Facebook and Instagram @cultivatedsense and on LinkedIn at
“Stephanie Ghoston Paul”. Also be sure to go to her website
stephanieghoston.com to
sign up for her newsletter and stay up to date on both the live and
web events she’s involved in.

I also hope you will connect
with Leading in Color at @leadingincolorpodcast on FB and Instagram
and @leadingincolor on Twitter. I’d love your feedback and
questions at my email leadingincolorpodcast@gmail.com --
and of course I want you to subscribe, rate and review the podcast
on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts and Spotify.

About the Podcast

Leading in Color is a bi-weekly podcast about cultivating intentional, positive workplace experiences and environments. From recruiting and hiring, to training and development, to coaching and discipline, to policy and strategy, to trends and hot topics. Leading in Color tackles each area thru a lens of diversity, equity, fairness and inclusion. Leading in Color also highlights the unique challenges and cutting-edge creativity of leading with social consciousness in the corporate world.
Join our host, Sarah Morgan, as she navigates these conversations in solo and guest interview episodes to provide practical advice and simple action steps for success.